My wife and I just got back from a week long camping trip, and I took my new FW12 along to support my general computing tasks (I normally use an older Dell for this), and to run some ham radio software (Winlink, JS8CALL). It was used out-of-doors for much of the day, and in some hot and humid conditions (in a tent with in steady rainfall). The laptop never got wet, but it was out and about in some very humid conditions. Here are some quick observations.
- Physically it held up very well. I’m impressed at how sturdy it is. At one point during the trip I laid the laptop on our camper bunk and went off to do other things, and returned to find my 16 lb dachshund mix standing on it - with all four paws. 16 lbs may not sound like much, but that weight concentrated on four small paws is significant. No damage
- Screen glare is a real issue for outdoor use. Does anyone make a matte screen protector for this thing?
- Battery life is an issue. Honestly I expected better. I got maybe five hours of continuous use running ham radio applications before I started looking for a power brick. I’m running Windows11, so that may be part of the issue, but still… need more battery life!
- Backlit keyboard. Yes please… ASAP, if possible. This laptop gets used a lot at night, under darkened conditions. I’m a very good touch typist, but there are still times when I need to look down at the keyboard to select certain keys to execute software commands. This means I needed to have a flashlight or headlamp handy. I know a backlit keyboard will impact battery performance, but it’s a trade-off I’m willing to make
- Touchscreen performance - great! Performance is very good. I took along an older Microsoft stylus made for a Surface Pro 7, and it worked fine, and I found it quite useful for making software menu selections when in the ‘tent’ mode, so I’ll be putting a FW stylus on order soon
- USB-C placement. This is one of the things I hoped would prove useful on the FW12, and it did. Being able to place a charge-compatible USB-C port on each side of the laptop body makes the FW12 much more versatile than a laptop with a charge port on only one side. This may sound trivial, but when I’m in a confined space, on a small table (like in a tent), and I’ve got a USB-C controlled radio to one side, the ability to power the laptop from the other side makes the FW12 much more versatile than any other laptop I own
- I found the digs about the FW12 being ‘chunky’ or too heavy to be irrelevant. It’s fine just the way it is. But then, one of my laptop paradigms is Panasonic Toughbooks so, by comparison, this thing is svelt
- The on/off button is about impossible to locate by touch. That needs improvement
A testament to how much I like this thing is that I’m seriously considering buying another stripped down i3 version to do some configuration testing on. Unless FW comes out in the next few weeks with a touch screen for the FW13…
Brian